Out of the Silence
by Mikel Midnight
Summary: DC Elseworlds set in Australia, in which Ultra and Dark Ranger encounter the political demogogue Earani, and must do battle against the menace of the Fearsome Five.


"Thank you for agreeing to the interview, Ms. Earani." The reporter took a seat opposite the woman who sat, poised, behind the gleaming silver desk. His face showed the wear and tear of the life he'd lived through his 60s, and small florid touches to his otherwise formal suit indicated some past traits of rebellion, and complemented his shoulder-length silver hair.

She smiled. "My pleasure, Mr. Grey. But please, call me Earani. May I call you Jonah?" In contrast, her face appeared youthful, her brow unfurrowed, her long hair a brilliant sheen of gold. Her features and physique were almost blindingly flawless, her voice a pleasing trill, is strangely accented.

"Of course." He returned her smile, and fumbled slightly as he slipped his cell phone from the pocket of his jacket, setting it to record their conversation. "So, before you were discovered in rural Victoria, you had been in suspended animation for ... 27 million years, is that correct?"

She chuckled, "Please, it was only 25 million. Allow a woman her vanities, please, I'd not want to think I'm showing my age." She winked at him teasingly, which only caused him to lose track of the note cards he held.

"The discovery turned many of our beliefs about human evolution on their heads, certainly."

"Much of our knowledge had been lost," she explained. "We appear superior because we had been able to carry out a worldwide program of eugenics. One of my ancestors spearheaded the movement and almost wiped out all the coloured races. Unfortunately, there were still some outliers, and after the cataclysm which destroyed our civilisation, they were able to breed and repopulate the planet."

"So," he said, gathering his thoughts, "you've been receiving a lot of support from the Australia First Party, and other similar right-wing groups, for the views you've advocated regarding eugenics and racial superiority. Some of your critics however have said your proposals violate legal boundaries, and are downright criminal. Would you care to comment?"

She sighed, and ran the tip of one long finger down the side of her temple. "This world of yours is full of pain and misery. Is any price too great that buys a perfect and wholesome humanity?" Earani asked. "You hold that to carry out my mission would be a crime. I hold that to fail in doing so would be a crime."

She rose to her feet, and beckoned to the world outside the window. "I was revived to complete the process my ancestors started, and create a racially-cleansed worldwide utopia. This land will be its capitol … the new Elektropolis raised from the ashes of the old."

* * *

Afterwards, he took a taxi back to his apartment, scribbling notes into a little pad. Having entered his home, his eyes swept the surrounding area, and slipped on a ring with a curious L insignia. His fingers pressed along the contours of his face, restoring his natural features of a man in his prime. With a rush of air, clad in a skintight uniform of purple trimmed with yellow, he flew out the window.

He hovered over the building he had visited before, in the guise of Jonah Grey. He heard a displacement of air behind him, and instinctively slowed down his metabolism and hardened his skin surface to invulnerability. He whirled around mid-air, and his eyes widened in astonishment at the sight of the man who soared through the air towards him. "Ultra," the other hailed him.

"Johnny Riley … Scout," he replied in greeting, penetra-vision piercing through the opaque visor the other man wore in order to see his true face. "You've taken on your mentor's legacy. Ought I call you Ranger, now?"

The other man shook his head. "I've been calling myself the Dark Ranger. It seems like the world's been a darker place since he died."

Ultra nodded slowly. "I can't think of a better man for the job. Will you be taking his place in the Justice League of Australia?"

"I don't know," Dark Ranger said. "I've been fighting crime longer than most of them, but I started when I was a kid, so … "

"There's a generational shift," Ultra replied in understanding. "When I started my career as a young boy, the only costumed adventurer anyone had heard of was the original Blue Tracer, decades before … and the current Blue Tracer is a legacy hero, too. But that's a very different situation."

"This isn't just a social visit," Dark Ranger said. "You were interviewing Earani, weren't you? What did you learn?"

"I'm not entirely sure." Ultra stroked his chin thoughtfully. "She's definitely a contemporary human, so almost certainly her story about being from an earlier species of humanity is so much nonsense. But there was something else … some sort of distortion field around her which was difficult to sort through. She's disguising herself."

"So despite the 'Death Ray' she's been showing off, she's probably a contemporary super villain and not what she's claiming to be. That's actually kind of comforting. But I have to ask, Almerac … you were born in the future, right? Wouldn't you already know her plans to take over the world don't succeed?"

"You and the Ranger were some of the very few people who knew I was born billions of years in the future, when Earth was being torn apart by tidal stresses from the sun, which had become a red giant. That's far in advance of even the Legion of Ultra-Heroes' era. But time is malleable, and we'd not want to cause an end to the futures we do know through inaction."

"So what're we going to do?"

"I for one," Ultra said, "am going to hope she's operating alone."

* * *

It was a cloudless morning when the sky over Canberra was rent by a flash of gleaming light. A tall blonde man of perfect beauty, clad in white, appeared in the air. His eyes scanned the city as the population pointed up at him in dismay, and then he soared over to the building which housed Earani. "Andax is here," he bellows outside her window. "For millions of years I have been sleeping high in the Himalayas, waiting for the time when humanity would re-evolve to a level of sophistication where it could benefit from our knowledge. You have cleared the way, and now together we can – "

"I think that's enough," Ultra interrupted, soaring up into the sky to meet him. "The modern era has no use for genocide."

Andax raised an eyebrow. "You seem of a superior stock to the cattle below, it would be a shame for you not to join us. Think of the good you could do, adding your abilities and technology to ours. I'm sure there is much we could learn from one another."

"We could build a world a tolerance for all, together," Ultra conceded, "if you wish to. If not … the galaxy is wide, and if I can provide transportation to somewhere you and Earani can populate with your own people. But that is my final offer."

"That is not the rule by which our civilisation reached the peak it had, "Andrax replied. "If you will oppose us, so be it." He focussed intently on the other man, waves of telepathic force projecting out at him. Ultra gasped in pain, and as his will faltered he began to tumble towards the ground. He recovered in time to save himself before he hit the ground, shocked pedestrians having cleared the way. "Stand back," he said to them, and took himself skywards once more.

The pair of them began to dual mid-air, Ultra alternating his powers between strength and invulnerability with expert precision as the two exchanged blows. Andax took the upper hand once again, and the man of tomorrow felt himself yielding under the blows of the man of the past. Once again he fell, and this time did not arise as he struck the ground.

The glass which stood between Andax and Earani's office shattered, and he flew in, taking her by the hand.

Earani screamed.

"Come with me, my love," Andax said, carrying her out to the skies.

"Who the hell are you? Let me go!" She struggled, and as Andax took her higher, Earani began to change shape, becoming smaller and darker. She gestured, and the man found himself surrounded by a yellow cloud.

"Mustard gas, eh? How long did it take you to learn that trick, Shimmer?"

"Who the hell are you?" she cried out.

Andax smiled, and pressed his fingers against his face to reshape his features. From below, the man clad as Ultra redonned the armour of the Dark Ranger, and rocketed back up to join them. He handed the flight ring back to his ally. "Earani was one of Dr. Dreamtime's illusions, wasn't she? I ought to have recognised the touch of the Fearsome Five in her antics."

Arcing over the horizon came a death-black flying wing, Captain Boomerang's and the Swagman's familiar faces at the helm. "Right on cue," Ultra said, as it swooped over them. A hatch on the bottom opened up, and Mammoth dropped down, followed by a series of boomerang-shaped missiles. "Let go of my sister," he grunted, landing on Ultra. Dark Ranger took off in a series of evasive manoeuvres, the heat-seeking boomerangs following him.

Ultra smirked, "So take her then," and threw the pair at the flying wing. A pair of the missiles diverted themselves from their pursuit and redirected towards the siblings, allowing Mammoth to catch his balance atop them. Ultra folded his arms. "Huh, fancy that."

With two of his pursuing weapons diverted, Dark Ranger whirled around, exploding the remainder with sonic blasts from his sidearm which activated their detonation systems from a safe distance.

Mammoth assisted Shimmer to the safety of the flying wing, and Dr. Dreamtime opened a hatch to let her in. Dark Ranger loaded his sidearm and fired it at Shimmer, the bullet expanding into a bolo which secured her arms at her side. She started to lose her balance, and he rocketed up to catch her. "I never get tired of doing that," he said, smirking behind his opaque visor. He hovered in mid-air, holding her tightly while she struggled. "If you cast any illusions at me, so help me I will drop her," he warned the other.

"Please!" Shimmer cried out, and the man raised his hands in surrender. Dark Ranger rocketed inside the flying wing, slamming the other man unconscious, and dropping his curvaceous cargo on the deck. He heard a small explosion, and a bullet pierced through his jetpack, knocking him to the ground. He slid out of it, groggily, and turned to see the armoured form of the Swagman, advancing over him.

"You know, we were content to acquire power through the political process," Captain Boomerang huffed, "but you had to go and embarrass our Earani like that. Ned, keep him busy while I check up on Mammoth."

Swagman started to kick at the prone Dark Ranger, who groaned. Captain Boomerang set the aerocraft to autopilot, and walked out on the wing, to watch Mammoth and Ultra fighting it out mid-air. He readied a hand weapon and directed it at the pair, and as it circled them in battle, targeted ultrasonics filled Ultra's mind, disrupting the will which directed his ultra-powers and rendering him vulnerable to Mammoth's bludgeoning blows.

Inside the flying wing, Dark Ranger shifted to his side and managed to catch hold of Swagman's foot. "You … think a few broken ribs … makes you as good as I am?" He twisted the foot to the side, causing Swagman to lose his balance as he filled the air with curses. Dark Ranger crouched over him quickly, forcing his opponent's helmet off his head and then hammering him with it repeatedly. He dragged himself to the cockpit and peered at the controls.

Captain Boomerang shouted in alarm as the flying wing tilted, causing him to lose his balance and fall to the Earth. He readied a rocket 'rang which kept him airborne, and watched with alarm as the aircraft tilted, traveling between the airborne combatants and knocking Mammoth off his supporting missiles. He plummeted to the ground, raising a cloud of dust as he slammed into it.

Ultra felt his mind clear, and flew over to Captain Boomerang. "That's enough of you lot," he said, reaching over to destroy the man's mode of transport and dragging him back to the interior of the aircraft, to see Dark Ranger fully in control. "Excellent job, the original couldn't have done any better."

Dark Ranger smiled beneath his helmet. "I was lucky, your plan surprised them enough that they weren't ready for battle. Grand larceny, this time?"

Ultra nodded, "That will keep them held up for a while. Australia doesn't need its political system polluted by racist right-wing demagogues like that fake Earani."

* * *

Earani was created by Erle Cox, and appeared in the novel _Out of the Silence_.

This is not the Ultraa of Earth-Prime, but a version of his silver-haired counterpart with the non-speaking role who appeared briefly in _Ultra Comics_.

Not depicted, but I had planned the Justice League of Australia to also include the Archer of the Outback, the Blue Tracer II (William Jones), Flux, Johnny Quick, Stormy Foster the Great Defender, and Tasmanian Devil.


End file.
